electro|botanic is an artistic research project, which sets out to study the electrical communication and perception of plants for an artistic purpose - as well to develop a sound installation, basing on the outcome of these studies. The project builds upon the movement reactive sound installation ‘Awareness and Movement in a Phonetic Garden; 2022’ (funded my Bauhaus University Summaery Fonds) - that explored plant perception in a speculative way by measuring and sonifying natural electric fields. ‘electro|botanic’ aims to go beyond a speculative approach. It raises the thesis that plants are electro sensitiv beings - meaning they are able to experience the world by sensing changes in electric and electromagnetic fields. Plants are often seen as passive, reactive and non-sentient. They even get treated as objects. Recent scientific discoveries reveal that plants have a vastly greater intelligence, as well as capabilities to perceive and communicate then we thought. Humans tend to think that intelligence is a human quality in the same way as we like to think electricity is a human achievement. In both cases we have been wrong. By questioning both preconceptions electro|botanic shifts the human perspective on our relation to our environment. Through this it dissolves the human-centric hierarchies of the Anthropocene and Technocene. electro|botanic aims to create a deeper understanding of plant perception and to illustrate this in form of interactive artwork.
In the seminar Beziehungsmuster: Umwelten der Kryptogamen Flora, I want to come up with a series of experiments to explore the relation between human presents/movement and the electric activity in plants. Electric micro-currents will be measured to track the bio-activity in the plants. The electro-sensitivity in the plants is measured because of the natural, human-electric fields - in the presumption, that plants could be able to perceive it. [Nick Cane (2015), Fromm Lauther (2007), Davies (2006)]
The project is funded by Bauhaus Universität Kreativ Fonds.